Traveler Submerged

27/12/2025

For nearly 20 years of diving - and around 10 as an instructor — I genuinely believed that one hour on a single tank on a reef was enough.

And to be honest… I was probably a bit smug about it.

I taught recreational diving, guided countless dives, and felt completely content staying well within no-deco limits.

Technical diving felt unnecessary, extreme, and honestly a little disconnected from the kind of diving I enjoyed and taught.

Then I moved to Malta.

The wrecks were deeper. The dives were more demanding. And the people I was diving with - especially the team at - weren’t chasing depth or ego.

They were calm. Methodical. Unrushed. Everything I admired in a diver, turned up a notch.

So I stepped into technical training, cautiously.

What surprised me most wasn’t the depth.
It wasn’t the stages or the gas switches.
It wasn’t even the decompression.

It was how slow everything became.

Tech diving taught me patience.
It taught me planning over improvisation.
It taught me that redundancy doesn’t increase stress - it removes it.

That buoyancy and trim aren’t “nice skills” but foundations.
That gas planning is about clarity, not restriction.
That awareness is something you build deliberately, not something you hope shows up.

And here’s the part I didn’t expect:

It made me a better recreational diver.
And a much better instructor.

I now teach from lived experience, not just standards or theory I once overheard on a dive boat.

I understand why things are taught the way they are. I see problems earlier. I react less. I create more space for students to feel calm and capable underwater.

I’m not an elite tech diver.
I’m not a CCR explorer.
I’ve logged around 50 staged decompression dives so far.

But technical diving humbled me - and that humility has been one of the most valuable lessons of my diving life.

If you’re a recreational diver or instructor who’s ever thought:

“Tech isn’t for me”

or

“I don’t need that kind of diving”

I once thought the same.

Sometimes progression isn’t about going deeper.
It’s about going deeper into understanding.

Curious to hear: what belief about diving did you once hold that later changed?

19/12/2025

Most divers know that failing to equalize can cause pain or injury but fewer realize that unequal equalization of the two ears can lead to disorientation and vertigo underwater.

From jaw movement to the Valsalva maneuver, choosing an equalization method that minimizes middle-ear stress is key.

This article explores alternobaric vertigo, what causes it, and how divers can reduce their risk. Read more here:

dan.org/alert-diver/article/understanding-alternobaric-vertigo.

Most divers know that failing to equalize can cause pain or injury but fewer realize that unequal equalization of the two ears can lead to disorientation and vertigo underwater.

From jaw movement to the Valsalva maneuver, choosing an equalization method that minimizes middle-ear stress is key.

This article explores alternobaric vertigo, what causes it, and how divers can reduce their risk. Read more here: dan.org/alert-diver/article/understanding-alternobaric-vertigo.

19/12/2025

Great discussion here in the comments - what do you think? Personally, I’m not a CCR diver, and helium is just too expensive to justify the benefits. Sure, on a deep Tec dive it has its benefits but… what do you think?

Is Trimix the New Nitrox? Thoughts on BSAC’s Deeper Diver Course

For a long time, trimix has been treated as something other in diving — technical, specialist, and only appropriate once a diver crosses a certain invisible threshold.

BSAC’s new Deeper Diver course takes a noticeably different approach, and I think it’s worth discussing.

The comparison that keeps coming to mind is nitrox in the early 1990s. Once controversial, nitrox eventually became normal not because it pushed depth, but because it improved understanding and reduced risk. It standardised the thinking, and divers then applied that thinking to dives they were already qualified to do.

Deeper Diver hopes to do something similar for deeper diving and helium.

BSAC has always permitted air, and later nitrox, to 50m. That hasn’t changed. What has changed is our understanding of narcosis, gas density, CO₂ retention, and cognitive performance at depth. It extends what a Sports Diver is already qualified to do by giving them the tools to make better-informed gas choices - air, nitrox, or trimix all the way to 50m.

Trimix is constrained. Oxygen must be no less than 20%, helium is capped at no more than 40%, and the maximum PO₂ is 1.4. This isn’t hypoxic trimix and it isn’t about extreme depth. It’s about managing narcosis and gas density sensibly, within clear guardrails.

Crucially, the course doesn’t mandate helium. It aims to educate divers so they can understand that there may be better options, and to understand the risks and trade-offs properly.

That approach is quite different from traditional trimix pathways, which are usually framed as explicitly technical, or from systems like GUE, where helium is normalised but only within a complete technical framework. Deeper Diver sits somewhere else: education first, progression second.

That said, I don’t think the course is beyond criticism. Personally, I think there’s a strong argument that it could sit at Sports Diver rather than Dive Leader, and I’m not entirely convinced by the pricing of the course pack relative to its content. Those points don’t undermine the intent, but they do affect accessibility.

Full transparency: my name appears in the Deeper Diver instructor manual as one of the authors. That’s exactly why I think it’s important to be open about both what works and what could be improved.

Whether you agree or not, I think this course marks an interesting moment in how we talk about deeper diving, gas choice, and education. I’m genuinely interested in hearing thoughtful perspectives from others.

16/12/2025

Grateful is an understatement.

Completing PADI Tec 50 Trimix has been a long-term goal, even if for years I swore I had no interest in heavy twins, extra deco bottles and added procedures.

Truth is, tec diving just hits different. It’s not a better way to dive - just a different one - and while the margins are tighter, the awareness, planning and control make it feel deeply intentional and, in many ways, safer.

Huge thanks to my mentor and trainer Chris Heitkemper at IDC & Tec Diving Malta and Starfish Diving Malta for the calm, precise teaching and constant support, and to everyone involved in the journey.

Don’t worry, I’m not giving up single-tank diving any time soon… but who knows, maybe Tec 50 Instructor is next. Staff Instructor in 2026 - let’s go.

Congratulations to Robin Bull who today completed his PADI Tec 50 TMX Course today with flying colours. IDC STAFF Course next in 2026! Thanks to Nico de Goffau for assisting, you are well on the way to becoming a PADI Tec 50 TMX Instructor! More news to follow! 👏🥳👌💪